The 2009 Fur Rondy Grand Prix. Photo by Mikhail Siskoff, used with permission.

Among the world’s great motorsports events, the Anchorage, Alaska, Fur Rondy Grand Prix may not carry the same prestige as the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Indianapolis 500 or the Dakar Rally, but that doesn’t mean the competition is any less intense. Long the premier event on the Alaska Sports Car Club’s (ASCC) schedule, the Fur Rondy Grand Prix was an essential component of the annual Anchorage Fur Rendezvous (Fur Rondy for short), a week-long winter celebration of all things Alaskan. Last held in 2009, the ASCC and Fur Rondy organizers have been stepping up their efforts to bring the race back, and it could return as early as 2014, though not in the previous downtown Anchorage location.

In 1960, the ASCC began running a downtown street race held in conjunction with the annual Fur Rondy. The earthquake of March 27, 1964, destroyed one of the streets that previously formed the course, so for the following year, the event moved to Sand Lake and centered on ice racing. Eventually, this became the North American Ice Racing Championship, but in 1977 the Grand Prix relocated back to downtown Anchorage as a winter street race, rejoining the Fur Rondy. Instead of hay bales, the course was traditionally lined with snow berms, which (oddly enough) seemed to guard against serious injury despite the event’s no-holds-barred racing. To keep things safe, the race was cancelled on years when snowfall was lacking.

The 2006 Fur Rondy Grand Prix.

Though the cars entered have evolved since the race began, sports cars have long been the platform of choice for the Grand Prix, along with an odd mix of home-built Frankenracers. Volkswagen Beetles powered by flat-six Porsche 911 engines are dominant in the Prepared class, while scaled-down Legends racers (styled after Fords and Chevrolets of the 1930s and 1940s, powered by Yamaha motorcycle engines) have become a popular entry in a dedicated class. As with SCCA racing, Improved Touring classes promote affordable racing, encouraging those with more modest budgets (and, perhaps, more modest ambitions) to mix things up on track.

The ASCC’s efforts to revive the race began in earnest last July, and the group created a Facebook page dedicated to the rebirth of the Fur Rondy Grand Prix. The Fur Rondy board of directors is in favor of bringing the race back as well, as it’s always proven to be a popular addition to the annual event, but the issue is funding. Per Jeff Barney, the Fur Rondy’s executive director, the cost to prepare the Anchorage street course for competition exceeds $80,000, a sum that’s simply not in the budget for 2014. Because the event would be held on municipal streets, only municipal workers and municipal equipment can be used to prepare the course (primarily for insurance purposes), and in previous years, funding for course construction came via grants. When the economy took a turn for the worse following the 2009 event, grant funding for the Fur Rondy Grand Prix went away, but Barney is optimistic that money can be raised for the 2015 event, which also marks the 80th anniversary of the Anchorage Fur Rendezvous. In the interim, Barney has been working with the ASCC to find a suitable (non-municipal) location to run the event in 2014.

The last Fur Rondy Grand Prix, in 2009.

With less than two months remaining before the start of the 2014 Fur Rondy, and a new race location not yet confirmed, only the most optimistic of race fans would bet on a Grand Prix being held this year. Assuming grant funding can be raised for 2015, the race should be back on the calendar, and that’s good news for competitors and spectators alike. Given the big-name stars who’ve competed there in the past (including Elliott Forbes-Robinson, Swede Savage and Bob Bondurant) and the level of enthusiasm exhibited by drivers in the videos we’ve seen of the event, the racing world needs a Fur Rondy Grand Prix. There’s plenty of factory-backed, homogenized and ready-for-television racing these days, but there’s never enough old school, wheel-banging action. Especially on narrow and slick city streets, lined with hard pack snow, in Porsche-powered Volkswagens.

In 1994 I was able to help my good friend, Ray McGoldrick with sponsorship of his 85 Toyota Celica IT race car and was his pit crew for the Fur Ronda Race. At the time I was working For Bear Automotive and I was allowed to set up in the pits and used my portable 1500 CCD Alignment equipment to set up a few of the race cars. The race was held down the hill from 4th avenue along the Rail Road property and the cars had to cross the tracks twice per lap plus deal with all of the manhole covers. Very hard on the suspensions and you didn’t want your car lowered too much. The snow was recycled to build all of the berms. It was the snow that had been removed from the streets with lots of sand and had been hauled to the holding sites around town. They then hauled it back to the area to make the track. Oftentimes the snow would melt and then re-freeze so sometimes it would be as hard as concrete when you crashed into it. Lots of the cars were damaged quite heavily when they crashed into the berms in the corners. Most of the drivers were very good about not hitting each others cars. It was true gentlemen racing until the stock car racers got involved. 1994 was the first year that a single stock car was allowed to compete. The Chevy Dealer owner in Soldotna (Hutchings Auto Group) bought his son a true 1 or 2 year old Chevy NASCAR cup car from the lower 48 and he was allowed to race it in the X Class. During practice laps before any of the official qualifying heats this young man was very aggressive and started pushing some of the other cars around and actually crashed a few of these special 1 year only super beetles quite badly. Several arguments with flying fist erupted in the pits afterwards and many threated to pull out of the race if the stock car was allowed to race. Promises were made and people calmed down and the race went on. Several 10 lap heats were run for qualifying with the main heats being 25 laps. The final race was 50 laps if I remember correctly. We used 5 gal gas cans of windshield washer fluid mounted in the passenger area with hoses running to each wiper blade to wash the crud off of the glass. We also used lots of Rain-X on the glass to make it stay clean longer. At this time there was only two classes but there was a lot more cars and racers. It was common to have 15 to 20 X class cars and 20 to 30 IT class cars. Many of these cars and drivers also participated in the Autocross events held at the Sullivan Sports Arena and the two main summer events that were held each year in Tanacross, AK at the airport. Thanks for this article. It brought back many great memories.